If you want a professional shatter plugin, or have $300 laying around, you should definitely check out Ruins 4.5. The cheaper alternative would be the ninja fracture script, which is $40. Unfortunately I don't know of any free shatter plugins or scripts :(.

You should avoid fracturefx and pulldownit and go for DMM or other solution.

Both of these plugins have heavy bugs and not stable (not mentioning that they results are so so).

Where i work they bought a license of each and we gave up quickly pulldownit and fracturefx, they are not really made for production and never gave us (when they worked) the results we wanted. So DMM all the way.
They have never been used in major movie (it talks by itself), justcheck their website, you'll just see independant user stories and showreel with 1-2 TV series (you could reach the same results with the fracturing tool in lightwave....)

You should avoid fracturefx and pulldownit and go for DMM or other solution.

Both of these plugins have heavy bugs and are not stable (not mentioning that they results are so so).

Where i work they bought a license of each and we gave up quickly pulldownit and fracturefx, they are not really made for production and never gave us (when they worked) the results we wanted. So DMM all the way.
They have never been used in major movie (it talks by itself), justcheck their website, you'll just see independant user stories and showreel with 1-2 TV series (you could reach the same results with the fracturing tool in lightwave....)

I've used PDI since day one, never had any real show stopper issues with it, and I have colleges who use fracturefx and they seem to really like the tool. So I'm not so sure the problem was the tool but rather the artist. There is no tool out there that is 100% bug free, what separates the pros working on blockbusters from the rest of the guys out there using the same tools is that the pro's can get the shot done despite bugs/limitations of a software by improvising and thinking of creative solutions to problems. If there is a show stopper bug, then sending an email to the dev's for support (not rant/bash fest) usually results in a positive response. The PDI guys sent a whole new build to us at my work when we encountered a minor inconvenient bug. Nothing but good experience with Carlos and his crew at PDI for us at SCEA.

Where i work, they chose DMM. Of course they've tried before pulldownit and fracturefx but didn't have a good experience with those plugin. They said it was unstable, slow and not made for real production.

Originally Posted by rochre26:Yep. Some of the work on these reels is not so hot.

I just saw puldownit and fracturefx showreel and i agree with you, they are not so hot
Knowing showreels are supposed to show the best that can be done with a tool it's kinda embarassing to show nothing very appealing .

Originally Posted by Nemo2020:Where i work, they chose DMM. Of course they've tried before pulldownit and fracturefx but didn't have a good experience with those plugin. They said it was unstable, slow and not made for real production.

Uhh that's just a flat out lie. Everyone knows one of DMM's major drawbacks is that it's slow especially compared to the other 2 options. Most people choose DMM because they want flexing of meshes and dynamic fracturing. I'm not saying one is better than the other, but I'm going to have to call bullshit as slowness being one of the reasons someone chose DMM over Fracture or PDI.

Again, these tools did fine in "real" production at Sony when I used it. I would be curious to know what bugs were so horrible that the software couldn't be used, please feel free to share them here or even an example file, I'll be glad to take a look at it and see if I couldn't get my shots out with the same bug. Time to put up people, no more vague bashing I want specific examples, perhaps if said bugs were submitted in bug reports they could be fixed in future versions.

I think the reels don't represent the plugins well. I've used PDI and it is really awesome. I've never had it crash or be buggy. I especially like the splinter and shatter options in versions 2.0 It gets away from that obvious voronoi pattern that seems so ubiquitous.

Yeah of course i am and i am also rochre26, because he made a negative criticism just above too. And i'll be any future members who will say something negative about your plugins.

Actually every one who didn't find your plugin so hot (it's good for you and pulldownit guy) is not credible right?

Sorry i forgot to put the robot costume you dream users who tried your plugins will wear, so let me change that:
fracturefx and pulldownit are amazing! Fastest than light, amazing fractures features, very cheap compare to Pixelux DMM (which is so far below your plugins) and i'm so glad for you that your plugin are so good that it's has been used in so many productions like "heroes" "the event" and "other films" and that pulldownit has been used in a scene in harry potter and in "other films". I'm so glad each time i see a fracturing job done with your plugins when i watch "other films" or "other films" or even "other films". But my favorite fracturing job was the one your plugins provided in "and other films in development"

Instructions for readers: replace "other films" and "and other films in development" by any film you want and be ready to be amazed!

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